


Of Fractures

by claremontdiaz (sharonsnatalia)



Category: Red White & Royal Blue - Casey McQuiston
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Break Up, Henry-centric, M/M, This starts after Henry tries to ghost Alex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-25
Updated: 2019-11-25
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:56:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,123
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21552652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sharonsnatalia/pseuds/claremontdiaz
Summary: Henry tells Alex to leave.
Relationships: Alex Claremont-Diaz/Henry Fox-Mountchristen-Windsor
Comments: 7
Kudos: 131





	Of Fractures

**Author's Note:**

> Some dialogue is taken from the book, most of the first scenes. Credit goes to Casey McQuiston.

“I’ll leave as soon as you tell me to leave.” 

Time slowed once the words left Alex’s mouth. They echoed in Henry’s head, slowly carving his already mangled heart. 

Henry didn’t want Alex to leave. He wanted to wrap him in his arms and press gentle kisses to his lips, his neck, his chest, every inch of his body until Alex knew that this was it for him. 

Henry wanted Alex to leave. Truly, he couldn’t do this, couldn’t live with someone who wanted desprately what he had considered a curse for so lone. He wanted life to be simple. He wanted to make his mother proud, to maybe, just maybe, stop feeling as if he let his entire nation down. 

He wondered, nearly delirious, if Alex could taste the salt gathering in his eyes, waiting for the chance to run free down his face. 

“Alex.” The name, spoken like a priest uttered God, came out broken. 

Now, Alex was so close to him, close enough to touch, close enough to kiss, close enough to-

“Tell me you’re done with me. I’ll get back on the plane. That’s it. And you can live here in your tower and be miserable forever, wrote a whole book of sad fucking poems about it. Whatever. Just say it.”

Even after everything, Alex still grounded him in this reality, in a reality where the two of them could be happy and in love and the world wouldn’t care, in a reality that was more fiction than fact.

“Fuck you.” Henry said. He wasn’t sure how it meant it, images of the door slamming as Alex stormed off and he allowed melancholy to claim him were interwined with memories of his lips around Alex, of Alex’s weight atop him. 

Alex was still so close, still such a dream. Henry reached forward, grabbed Alex’s shirt collar, and stepped forward, Icarus moving ever closer to the sun. He wanted to push him away. He wanted to kiss him.

As Alex spoke, Henry felt the warmth of his breath against his lips, “Tell me,” there was something close to a smile on Alex’s lips, “to leave.”

In that moment, it barely felt like a chose to push Alex back against the wall, to crowd against and push their bodies together, to finally, finally, kiss him after all the horribleness that had gone on between them. 

Henry didn’t bother to hide the fervor of his kiss, to disguise his worship of Alex as anything other than that. It was rough, tasting of love and self-loathing in equal parts. He kissed Alex like he was the oxygen he needed to breath.

With Alex’s hands in his hair, he forgot about the world around him, forgot about the obligations and expectations that existed outside this gilded dream they built together. 

He moved to pick Alex up, move this to a move suitable location when the world returned to him. A world where princes were to fall in love with handpicked girls, where First Sons were off the table for everyone in the monarchy but especially him rushed back to him. This was not something he could have. 

Breaking the kiss, he set Alex back down, an apology, a prayer, already on his lips. Still, his eyes remained on Alex’s lips, swollen and red, and a heat rose within him.

Running a hand through his hair, he stepped back. 

Alex surged forward. “Henry-”

“Don’t.” Henry’s tone was final. “We can’t do this, Alex. Not anymore.” He wondered, briefly, ever the masochist, how the break between Alex and Nora had gone so that they remained friends.

After taking a few more steps back, further away from Alex, he spoke again, “I want you to leave.”

The words were a betrayal, a betrayal to the fragile love they had tended between them, to the texts and the emails exchanged, to the hopeful glint in Alex’s beautiful dark eyes. 

Tears, at last, ran down his face. “I’m sorry.”

He wanted Alex to leave. He wanted Alex to stay.

“No, you fucking aren’t.”

The door slammed. Somewhere, some time later, a plane took off. 

Henry nearly wished he could take the words back as he laid in bed that night. 

* * *

Bea ran her hands through his hair, the dullest of comforts. When she spoke, finally, her voice was quiet, “Darling, it will be okay.”

Henry was curled on the piano bench, his head resting in Bea’s laps as she offered meaningless comforts. He missed Alex, had missed Alex since they first became friends, had missed him more and more as their relationship shifted and shifted until now. 

_ And you can live here in your tower and be miserable forever.  _ Even now, he marveled at Alex’s intelligence, at how well he knew Henry. The thought consumed him.

Later, after his heart mended a fraction, Bea lectured him, told him the many ways he fucked up before she announced the world was still turning, and helped him, once again, pick up the pieces of himself he shattered on his own. Now, however, she held him close and fetched him tea, tried to lessen the pain that beat in tune with his heart.

* * *

The emails were leaked. The most personal things Henry had every written had been leaked, and now, every secret, everything he bit his tongue to keep in, was free to be consumed by the public. 

“Henry. Look at me.” Bea’s words came out soft. Her hands cupped his face as she spoke. “I know this sucks but it doesn’t matter that people know you are gay. It’s just horrible how they found out.”

In that moment, it was impossible for him to bring himself to believe her, not when he’d given up Alex and the world still ended up knowing about them, not when one look at twitter saw the fervent beginnings of a fandom for a relationship that he burned down himself. His heart ached, and he missed the warmth of Alex’s skin again his. 

“You know how Gran is going to react.” He shock his head. 

“Fuck Gran.” Was the only response Bea gave.

* * *

Since the leak, his phone had been buzzing nonstop, calls from the press, from his mother, from June, from  _ Alex,  _ and he had steadfastly ignored them until his phone had been confiscated. No matter how much he itched to talk to Alex, to hear him talk for the first time in too long, he had already ruined things between them.

“Henry, it’s for you.” Shaan hadn’t strayed far from his side since the incident first started. Now, he stood there, personal cell phone in hand. After a moment, he cleared his throat, “It’s Alex.”

Without a thought, Henry accepted the phone. “Hi, Alex.”

**Author's Note:**

> Follow my twitter: @stardustedreads
> 
> Leave kudos and comment if you are a real gay ally


End file.
